(Washington, D.C. – July 26, 2013) Today, the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit dismissed
lawsuits filed by the state of Texas and a group of power companies that
could have undermined vital clean air protections and hurt efforts to reduce
climate pollution.

The lawsuits had challenged efforts by the Environmental
Protection Agency (EPA) to ensure smooth, uninterrupted permitting of large
sources of greenhouse gas emissions, as required under America’s clean air
laws. Permitting ensures that large emitters deploy modern pollution control
technology to cost-effectively reduce their climate pollution.

Today’s dismissed
lawsuits are part of an ongoing set of challenges the state of Texas has
mounted against some of the most important climate protections in our country.

“Instead of using its taxpayer dollars to litigate and obstruct
clean air protections, Texas should invest in expanding its world-class wind
energy resources, and in building a stronger clean energy economy,” said Peter Zalzal, an attorney for
Environmental Defense Fund, which was an intervenor in the
case. “Investing in clean energy instead of lawsuits will benefit Texas communities
facing the debilitating impacts and soaring costs of the extreme weather linked
to climate change.”

In the rulemaking at issue here, EPA took action to ensure that
large greenhouse gas emitting sources in certain states could obtain the permits
they needed for construction and deployment of modern technologies to reduce
their emissions.

All states except Texas worked with EPA to ensure that a
permitting authority was in place.

In today’s decision, the court concluded that the Clean Air Act
unambiguously required large greenhouse gas emitting sources to obtain these
construction permits. The court also found that because EPA’s limited
actions allowed sources to obtain permits that they otherwise could not obtain,
neither the power companies nor states had standing to challenge them.

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